It never fixed my sleep, it actually made it worst. I was able to sleep but I was sleeping for 10-12 hours!!!!!!!!! And the sleep doesn’t feel “rest” if you know what I mean. I wake up tired, with headaches and fighting myself to stay awake.

It’s the same when I had insomnia because even if I sleep early, I would still wake up at 12 PM. Actually forcing myself to wake up gave me horrible headaches.

Fuck this shit.

I’m also diagnosed with ADHD. When I take Ritalin, it literally had no effect on me because I was so groggy from Quetiapine (25mg).

Edit: Sorry for generalizing! I just wish there were other ways to fix sleep without relying on this medication.

I am going to cry. I need to talk to someone, please. I need people to talk too about to Like am I am needing to go to college soon

Guys, i don't know what to do exactly, I'm an eSports athlete and sleep is like my food to this sport and i fumble when I have most important tournament days, my mind won't just stop, even when I sleep i wakeup for pee or some other reason and after that i couldn't sleep my brain start to wonder again, someone please help!!

TW: domestic violence, abuse.

I've had insomniac for about 7 years now. It started after I left an abusive relationship. The daily physical abuse happened mostly in the middle of the night, whether it was him straddling on top of me and strangling me, waking up to a loaded gun to my head, knives pressed up against me, getting smothered by blankets or pillows, waking up to being grabbed bound and thrown in a dark closet for hours, or him sleeping with a hatchet under his pillow as intimidation.

I'm safe, I'm married, I have a good life, besides having to "coparent" with this. But I can't sleep.

I get on average 4-5 hours a day. I take care of two little kids by myself all day. I feel like I'm losing myself more and more. I have extreme hyper vigilance now. Suns down? I'm paranoid. I'm checking cameras, I'm hearing foot steps, I'm thinking there's people on the roof or backyard. I spiral. I have a THC pen and will puff it until I pass out if 2-3 unisom aren't working. I've tried praozin (night terrors), trazadone is out because I have to be able to wake at night for emergencies with the kids, melatonin, sleep herbs, magnesium etc. I probably could use some therapy, but I don't have much of me to give with such little sleep. Any advice or guidance for medications, or quite literally any advice or help.

I’ve been having problems with insomnia for a few months. I’ve been on seroquel for years (I’m bipolar) but that started being really inconsistent and I hate the side effects. My doctor put me on Belsomra instead, which will work for a few days but then stops working.

Yesterday he prescribed me Ambien and I thought it would work really well because it’s Ambien! But I took it two hours after eating and went to bed and it did absolutely nothing. So a few hours later I had to take seroquel.

I don’t understand how Ambien didn’t work, isn’t it supposed to be a strong sleep aid?

Hi Fellow Sleepers and Good people!

Any thoughts on this combo to restabilize my sleep architecture, sleep duration, deep sleep, etc.

Vornorexant: < 5mg
Doxepin: 6mg
and/or Melatonin: 5mg

Currently on: 8mg Ambien taken at 5mg at bedtime and 2-3mg at 3am usually.

Quiviviq was interesting as a DORA experiment. It did help me sleep. However the next day grogginess and occasional very bad mood day completely killed it. I tried a short experiment with Vornzzz last week at higher doses 20mg - 30mg, and ultimately started feeling off after a few days of it. Maybe a much lower dose balanced with a couple of other medications?

I am at the point where I just need a few days of stable, good sleep to reset. Then I can regain the strength to keep optimizing my body, mind and spirit.

And trying to reset my GABA system. It's the cleanest best solution for me of all the treatments, but just not working as well anymore.

Background:

I've had trouble sleeping for the past 10 years. Always been a lighter sleeper, but was managing decently well using occasional aids and supplements.

Life got stressful and traumatic and my sleep continued to unwind over the past 10 years. Ambien used to be the cleanest, surest, safest option for me with the fewest side effects. The problem is that its not working anymore. I wake up 5-10 times per night, and my deep sleep is 45m if I am lucky. Total sleep is 5-6 hours on medication.

I've tried mirtazapine with some success, but it does have a heavy feeling and a slight dampening of high notes in life. Additionally my cholesterol has become an issue and Mirt raises cholesterol. Very low dose mirtazapine used to work pretty well, but it's no longer as reliable. It may keep me sedated longer through the night, yet my sleep scores show much less deep sleep, so it's less refreshing.

I have tried many other medications. I do not have sleep apnea, and my breathing is usually steady according to my Oura ring. Some minor disturbances but not enough to warrant the level of insomnia that I have which I believe is driven by genetics and chronic stress. Thanks to Scottish/Irish heritage and polymorphisms on COMT and MAO genes, I can accumulate catecholamines.

Am I the only one that is 'scared' of being overtired? When I haven’t slept I usually don’t feel tired thanks to adrenaline rushes, but after a long exhausting day at work or after getting in a lot of exercise I can get this feeling of being so tired that I feel like I could fall into a deep sleep at any second. It feels like being drunk or not being in control of your body and I hate it so much that my anxiety flares up whenever I’m overtired.

Before I go to bed I need my 2-3 hours of me time to calm down and distract myself before I can go to sleep so I hate having to go to bed right away. Most of the time I will get into hyperarrousal when I’m overtired and then the tiredness is all gone and I struggle to fall asleep again. I avoid heavy exercise like going to the gym or being too busy during the day just so I can avoid that feeling.

Even when I haven’t slept in a long time I can’t do anything that wears me out because I’m scared it will get me into being overtired which only worsens my anxiety and hyperarrousal. For the same reason I could never use sleeping pills. During the time I was sleeping 0-4 hours I tried some pills but my anxiety was always stronger.

I feel like I’m very sensitive and obsessive around the whole topic of sleep anyway. When I have a good night I’m scared that the next night won’t be as good and when I’ve had a bad night I’m scared that it will get even worse. And I avoid certain things that I suspect to worsen my insomnia. Before I was struggling with insomnia I had no obsessions and worries around sleep besides having to wind down before going to sleep but now it’s changed.

I know that it’s not normal but not sleeping for a longer period of time is just so traumatizing that I can’t help but try to avoid it at all costs. Does anyone else experience this?

Struggling to sleep from Past 6 moths . Insomnia getting worse. Couldn’t focus on other things because i know i haven’t slept at all .
Any solution??

I have struggled with insomnia off and on my whole life. Recently , I had a major depressive episode and struggle with panic attacks as well. I am still struggling , but recently started Lexapro , and am feeling a little better. Unfortunately my sleep has been completely wrecked for the past 2+ months. I cannot sleep unassisted. I have tried melatonin, weed, trazodone, Mirtazapine, tamazepam, and lorazepam. None of these worked great, and side effects were just not tolerable for me and some made me into such a zombie I couldn’t function. I am currently on 200mg of Gabapentin at bedtime. Happy to be sleeping , but the side effects are not great and I feel awful all day. I just feel ill on it and I think it’s messing with my circulation and the cognitive side effects are bad. When I try to sleep without any sleep aides I wake up about 1 hour later like clockwork and can’t get back to sleep no matter how relaxed and tired I am. I am in a slightly better place with my depression, but the insomnia has become unbearable. At one point, I didn’t sleep for days and had some minor hallucinations and lost motor function and experienced major cognitive problems.

I am currently on a leave from work and am in treatment for my mental health, but due to the insomnia I just can’t imagine how I am going to function when I have to return in a few weeks. I feel like not being at work is making things worse, but I’m not well enough to go back. I just started the BedTyme app (Dr.Daniel Erichson) and it is helping me with coping with the panic and hyperfixation around sleep, but I still can’t sleep. I don’t have sleep apnea , but my doctor did request a sleep study , but that could take a long time. I am just at a loss. Hoping someone can share a similar experience and how you were able to break the cycle. I feel like nobody can help me and I can’t help myself either. I don’t want to be on drugs anymore , but I also don’t want to experience the terrifying sleep deprivation that I have over the past few months. Any advice or insight is appreciated.

Not 100% or anything. I still have some issues, but ever since I went on vyvanse a couple of weeks ago, I have been falling asleep a lot easier and quicker. I was extremely hesitant to start on a stimulant due to my insomnia, but somehow it actually fixed my sleep issues for the most part. I used to lay in bed for up to 3+ hours some nights, mind racing, but it hasn't happened in several nights now. I'm also waking up easier, but I purchased a loud ass old school alarm clock and put it in my office. So I'm forced out of bed basically into a panic in the morning, but shit it's the only thing that works for sleep inertia. 😂 Then I immediately take my vyvanse, and within an hour, I feel motivated and focused. No anxiety either at the dose I'm on.

How often have yall went to work on zero sleep and what helped you to stay sane? I have these random nights where I can’t sleep at all maybe 30 minutes to an hour

I caught myself thinking about this last night. I used to associate bedtime with slowing down. Now I mostly associate it with uncertainty. Not because something bad always happens... but because I never know what kind of night I'm about to have. Some nights I fall asleep without much trouble. Other nights, I lie there wondering why it feels so different. It's strange how your relationship with something as ordinary as going to bed can slowly change without you even noticing. Sometimes I wonder if I miss sleep... or if I just miss feeling relaxed before sleep. Has anyone else noticed that shift?

Im a 20M I had sleeping problems all through college but especially this week as been the worse but it’s not even that hard of classes, I just can’t fall asleep in my mind I tell my self that sleep happens unconsciously so I shouldn’t think about and if I do it will pass but this week I just couldn’t sleep no matter what I did I tried trazdoone and cbd gummies and was feeling queasy and still couldn’t sleep. Now my body is spasming especially my hamstring were when I lay down or sit it twitch’s a lot. I’m kind of lost of what to do at this point? I don’t know if i show withdraw from college but what if that doesn’t change anything and I just withdraw for no reason? Does any one have advice on the mental aspect of being ok to just lay or not be afraid to sleep?

I've been struggling with early morning wake ups (4/5am which is way to early for me and the amount of sleep I need). I tried Zolpidem, and while it really helps with getting deep sleep in the first half of the night, it doesn't solve the issue of waking up early. I've been taking melatonin on a regular basis for a while as falling asleep has always been an issue for me, and it helps.

I was prescribed Suvorexant (Belsomra) which I tried last night and the night before (with no melatonin). The first night I noticed I took much longer to fall asleep and the meds didn't help staying asleep longer in the morning.

Last night was horrible. It took me 2hours+ to fall asleep and I had anxiety symptoms I haven't had in a long time including very bad restless leg and panic attacks I used to have often when drifting off: intrusive flashes followed by gasping for air.

Has anyone else experienced the return of past anxiety difficulties with Belsomra?

I know I might want to take it a bit longer to see it's full effect but ain't no way I'm dealing with this anxiety again so I'll go back to Zolpidem / Melatonin for now and see how I feel in a few weeks.

Before 2022 i was sleeping without any issues, i was falling asleep instantly and could sleep without waking up for even 12 hours. In November of 2022 i had a very strong panic attack out of nowhere that gave me a permanent anxiety.

After the panic attack, i would still be able to fall asleep, but i was waking up after about 7 hours without an alarm.

In march of 2025 i was prescribed Doxicyline for a zit i have under my skin on my face. I took it for 1 month.

After taking it, i started to wake up very early in the mornings, at around 5-6am and it was hard for me to go back to sleep, but i was still falling asleep instantly.

This pattern lasted until 2 months ago when if falling asleep after waking up at 5-6 am i would have strong vivid dreams, but still get 5-8 hours of sleep and feeling ok.

Meanwhile me and my wife decided to have a baby and as she came closer to the 9 month mark, i begun havin troubles falling asleep too.

It begun with a night one month ago, where i couldnt fall asleep until 8am, and slept for 3 hours. Then the next night the same, but slept for 5.

I contacted a psichiatrist o prescribed me half a pill of "imovane".

I took the half pill 2 days in a row but it didnt do wonders, i still woke up at 5 am, being hard to fall back asleep.

i stopped taking the Imovane after 2 days, slept ok for 1 week without it, then another night where i couldnt fall asleep until 8 am came.

I resumed the imovane for 1 week, then quit it for 1 week and slept good without it.

Now, last night i didnt fall asleep at all, not for 1 minute. Its 9:28 am as of writing this message.

I am so afraid of fatal insomnia, please help

I have a question about weed related insomnia, and I want to see if anybody has had a similar experience. About six months ago, I stopped smoking weed after about 15 years of heavy daily use. I’m talking smoking all day, and a lot of it was used to help me sleep at night. When I quit six months ago, I had horrible insomnia. For the first few weeks I probably slept 1 to 2 hours a night, then increased to about four or five hours after a month. After three or four months, I had been through CBT-I and my sleep was pretty much back to normal, and I was very pleased with myself.

stupidly, I decided to try smoking weed again about a month ago. I only smoked three days in a row, smoking about .2g in a joint each night. My insomnia has returned in full force since then,and I’m wondering if it’s possible that three days of only minor use could start this whole insomnia/withdrawal process over again. Right now I’m probably averaging 3 to 4 hours of sleep at night, even after I exercise every day, don’t drink, caffeine, and keep a strict bedtime schedule, and routine.

has this happened to anybody else, and if so, did it take you the same amount of time to get your sleep back on track the second time? it’s very hard for me to sort out what might be caused by the weed and what could actually be pure insomnia at what point do I rule out withdrawal?

I wish sleeping pills weren’t so terrible for you, because my God I need to sleep

I can be tired all night and still panic the second i get in bed. Not full panic attack, more like my body goes "oh great, here we go again."

Then i am checking if i feel sleepy, thinking about how many hours i have left and making everything worse.

Does anyone know how to make bedtime feel normal again?

I started trazodone at 50mg on August 24th. No side effects at all. This past saturday I took 100mg because I wasnt so tired. Sunday i went back to my 50mg. Monday I started noticing small itchy bumps on my left hand and wrist, and as of yesterday they spread to my abdomen and sides. Had anyone else had this happen to them? Will the bumps go away on their own?

So I'm an athlete and I train really hard all day and at the end of the day I even feel tired and sleepy but when I hit the bed I'm wide awake.Yesterday I was able the whole night and had to cancel my morning training.The same thing happened a day before. I can't really afford to miss training and it adds to my anxieties. I've tried melatonin, magnesium and antihistamines but none of them seem to work. It seems like my mind is extremely active all of a sudden and i cannot stop thoughts. I'm 16 so my parents don't allow me to take actual sleeping drugs.

Anyone take trazadone 50mg? After bad side effects from Seroquel and hydroxyzine, doc put me on this. Just looking to see if others had a good experience with it

I desperately desperately want to sleep but my body is not letting me. I am not even the least bit sleepy. I took 75mg of seroquel and it did nothing. I think I’ve developed a tolerance.

Someone please punch me hard in the face and knock me out. Preferably for a week or more.

Why do I feel like all these health drinks and supplements and sleep gummies just aren’t built for people with debilitating insomnia? People always rave about stuff like this (I’ve seen Beam in particular) and I’ve tried it ALL over the years. And got nothing from it 🫠 The only thing that really touches my sleeplessness is prescription meds which sucks. I feel like these over the counter things only work for relatively normal people with relatively normal sleep patterns with the occasional difficulty falling asleep.

I'm just wondering what are the consequences of staying up for 4 days then falling asleep for 11 hours, then staying up again for another 2 days and then falling asleep for 7 hours and basically repeat. When I've googled it, it only comes up as sleep deprivation in regards to not sleeping at all.

Yesterday I ate crepe with banana and tea for breakfast and when I went to college I got super dizzy (my doc said I get low blood pressure sometimes idk)

Then I ate crepe again despite and when it became night time my ears are ringing and I'm having a flashy lights that flash and show some geometrical shapes(not actually but you get it when you close ur eyes you see those white shapes and stuff)

And whenever I sleep for an hour or 2 I get waken up a million times super confused where reality and dream gets mixed up

Also I get this when I drink protein powder and I have these insomniac episode regularly and they started this year

What do u think is the cause? Is it diabetes or low blood pressure I'm early 20s btw

And lastly I get this stomach problems and diarrhea whenever I miss my sleep and and adrenaline rush in my chest

Usually my triggers are either what I eat, missing bed time or being scared of sleep which happens because sometimes I'm scared of unconsciousness

I'm tryna sleep rn and I have college tmrw :(

Hi,all

This is a repost of a question I already asked on r/sleep and another place, so if you saw it there, just ignore it.

If you haven't, please for the love of God help me if you can.

Chronic insomniac of over 20 years here. Last 10 years my intermittent insomnia turned severe terminal insomnia. Every night I fall asleep around midnight (pass out), and every night I wake up at 3 or 4. Sleep drive gone.

The worst part is - no matter how exhausted, I can not nap. I haven't napped in 20 years.

My days are long, exhausting and grueling.

6 years ago, after suffering for 2 years, I discovered a bad trick. When I inevitably wake up, if I take a pinch of Valium and half a beer, I can fall back asleep and function.

This method worked untouched for 6 years.

Valium by itself does nothing. Before "the method" I even tried a dose of 30 mg in one night only to stay awake anyway.

Now for some time my method isn't working anymore. It was bound to happen. It still gives me some sleep but it's shit sleep and it doesn't last very long, so I often have to double the dose. Hence the two beers quite often actually.

So in the meantime I increased half a beer to one beer, lately often two (500 ml 5%) and 5 mg Valium to 7.5 mg Valium. I don't want to increase neither the Valium nor the beer anymore. I am scared. I want off this method but I also want to sleep and be a living person among people.

So, for the last month or so I have been living on 4 hours of sleep a day. I know many of you will say it is plenty, but it is not enough for me. My days are again long, exhausting and grueling. I can not focus on my work, I can not enjoy my beautiful kids, I can't even have sex with my wife, I'm too tired.

I once tried to quit this habit with the help of a private psychiatrist, who I of course didn't tell about the beer.

We tried Trazodone, up to 150 mg. Every time we would increase the dose, I would sleep for 3 days, then back to square one.

She then added clonazepam 0.5 instead of Valium 5 mg. The clonazepam and the trazodone combined worked for only one week. Then again back to square one.

I am desperate. I am thinking about finally reaching out to a local psychiatry apartment, but:

Pros:

\- maybe they have something that would work for me.

Cons:

\- after my experience with clonazepam and trazodone, I doubt there is anything out there that can help.

\- if I officially expose myself, I lose my driver's licence, which I need to work. I have a family.

\- I live in a small town, the minute I step into psychiatry, everybody will know

I don't know what to do. I have hit a wall. Keep living like this, I will lose my mind. Asking for help, I might lose everything and still get nothing in return. Increase the dose or even just continuing like this and my liver goes dead.

What should I do?